[NCUC-DISCUSS] Reuters reports new cooperative formed to take over management of .ORG

Kathy Kleiman kathy at dnrc.tech
Mon Jan 20 18:16:07 CET 2020


All,

I'm a little shocked by the discussion. ISOC took on .ORG 15 years ago 
with obligations of stewardship to the .ORG community. We remember those 
obligations. When I worked at PIR, in 2010+, I lived and breathed those 
obligations. We worked and cared about the .ORG community. It was part 
of the fabric of ISOC (then located down the hall) that we build and 
foster the .ORG community.

ICANN has decided -- without public input or agreement and without 
Multistakeholder processes -- that New gTLDs can do anything to compete 
against legacy gTLDs, including that they can buy and sell intellectual 
property protections and content censorship /that we never agreed to as 
a Community. /Registries can raise and lower prices; they can take down 
domain names at will; frankly, new gTLDs can abuse their registrants.

Which is why most registrants stay in the legacy gTLDs, .com, .org, and 
.net.  Because Verisign has an ongoing obligations - via the US 
Government - to fair pricing and content neutrality. ISOC, via .ORG, has 
stewardship obligations to care for and foster the .ORG community and 
noncommercial, nonprofits, and NGOs around the world (as well as 
educational, research and hobby groups).  The founding documents of 
ICANN are very clear that the Internet is not private property, but 
valued and shared resources, particularly the DNS.

A few things to remember:

**We** (ICANN Community) did not agree to the massive changes to the 
.ORG contract that took place over the summer. That was ICANN Org's 
drafting and ICANN Org's decision to weigh the comment of the IPC 
(Intellectual Property Constituency) in favor of the changes **against 
3200 comment opposing the changes.** There was no Multistakeholder 
agreement here.

**We** (.ORG Community) did not know about or agree to the sale of .ORG 
on terms that ensure absolutely no protection for the .ORG registrants 
(the community our NCUC constituency represents).  If you want to see 
how bad policies will significantly damage the traditional .ORG 
community, please read the very eloquent concerns that EFF is writing.  
NOTE: not a single public process/comment has taken place on this sale.  
GAC has taken the lead in asking for public processes -- NCUC should be 
asking for public processes too!

---------------

The Internet was always a shared system -- like the airwaves.  If you 
license a radio station almost this work -- because the rules we wrote 
protected communities we cared about and a broad array of speech. Ditto 
for telephone systems.  Ditto for the global Domain Name System. It's 
why many of us have devoted so many years to trying to write good, fair 
and balanced policies for the DNS.

Now, increasingly, ICANN Org has no use for registrants or the 
Multistakeholder Model. Staff re-writes any consensus policy they want; 
Staff writes contract allowing content control (censorship) beyond the 
scope and limits of ICANN's own Bylaws. Our obsession for years at ICANN 
has been the rights of registries -- and we have forgotten about 
Registrants.

But we're the NCUC and it is our job to remind ICANN that that promises, 
protections, and good stewardship were obligations made by ISOC when it 
took on .ORG.  Andrew Sullivan and Vint Cerf may no longer consider DNS 
"cool," but the Public Interest Registry which runs .ORG is a legal 
"child corporation" of ISOC, both are non-profits and both made 
obligations to .ORG registrants -- our NCUC members (and the larger 
community we represent of .ORG registrants).

Milton may have a personal vendetta with Esther Dyson, but that's beside 
the point:  WikiMedia gets more hits daily than almost any other .ORG 
domai name; it has every right (indeed the obligation) to protect the 
massive amount of information it supports -- the treasure trove of 
research, facts and analysis written by the public. WikiMedia is also a 
founding member of CCOR.  And let's not forget the diversity of groups 
that flock to .ORG as registrants-- including noncommercial, research, 
educational, personal, political, religious, ethnic, gender (how many 
hundreds of times have we in NCUC, NPOC and NCSG written these words?). 
They all deserve the protection that we, NCUC, have fought for on their 
behalf for two decades.

Having worked at .ORG, under ISOC, I believe ISOC's obligations and 
commitments of stewardship for .ORG are binding. For the lawyers on the 
list, please remember the enforcement mechanisms that exist for 
contracts and representations. We all relied on them in building our 
treasured web presences under our .ORG domain names.

If ISOC is ready to relinquish an asset */f/*/or which it paid not a 
single cent//, /I think there should be an opportunity for organizations 
to step forward who will honor the obligations of ISOC to .ORG and 
protect the .ORG community.  CCOR is starting that discussion and that 
is a good thing! *
*


Best, Kathy

Kathy Kleiman, AU WCL, Former Director of Policy for .ORG, co-founder NCUC.



On 1/20/2020 11:08 AM, Martin Pablo Silva Valent wrote:
> “What matters is the Registry Agreement, as I've said all along. “ 
> Exactly, I don’t know why we go around the bush. This agreement gives 
> PIR and ICANN right and obligation. Unless we wanna breach it, and pay 
> the consequences, which no one wants to, we have to play by the rules 
> we wrote as an organisation. Let’s talk that, let’s talk how we are 
> gonna play that chess, because there is no other, any debate outside 
> it is irrelevant and distractive.
>
> On the other hand, I agree that CCOR in no way gives me any trust or 
> insurance, much less ICANN hand picking registrars. Our insurance, our 
> warrants, is the Agreement. If we want a different .org operation we 
> don’t need to look further than the agreement we own, and that in 
> later renewals we can change, we can negotiate to change it with the 
> current holders, etc.
>
> Let’s talk about the agreement, how we can use it, and what channels 
> do we have to work it. Don’t loose the focus.
>
> Martín
>
>
>> On 13 Jan 2020, at 17:33, Mueller, Milton L <milton at GATECH.EDU 
>> <mailto:milton at GATECH.EDU>> wrote:
>>
>> Alan
>>
>> In your discussion of At Large elections, you fail to note that Mike 
>> Roberts, Esther Dyson, Andrew McLaughlin and the entire initial board 
>> and legal staff of ICANN were adamantly opposed to having elections 
>> and membership at all. Not opinion, fact. They delayed the elections 
>> as much as they could. And when we had them, elections were limited 
>> them to 5 board seats instead of the entire board. And then after the 
>> members elected dissidents to the board that the staff and board 
>> didn't like, they abolished them and created the current 
>> dysfunctional RALO/ALAC structure.
>>
>> So you seem to have a rather distorted perspective on ICANN's early 
>> history and the role of these characters in it. No one in the early 
>> days of NCUC/NCSG viewed Dyson or Roberts as friendly and supportive 
>> of our community.
>>
>> As for the claim that CCOR is "way better" than Ethos/PIR, three 
>> responses. First, there is no indication that ICANN is in any 
>> position to simply re-bid the entire ORG delegation to anyone who 
>> pops up, and if it does rebid it should be via an open call, not an 
>> insider deal such as is proposed by CCOR. Second, CCOR would have a 
>> lot more credibility with the community if it was not based on a 
>> cabal of old ICANN insiders. I mean Esther Dyson? Really? Third, as a 
>> cooperative they claim that ORG would be run by its "members" by 
>> which they mean ORG registrants. Since the _majority_ of ORG 
>> registrants could very well be defensive registrations and domainers, 
>> it is not clear to me that this is a win for us.
>>
>> As for Wikimedia, they are the lipstick on the pig. Nice people, 
>> great mission, but CCOR is just another claimant for a $1,135 billion 
>> asset, no different in principle from ISOC or Ethos. Whatever they 
>> are proposing is nothing more than a promise at this point, just like 
>> Ethos. What matters is the Registry Agreement, as I've said all along.
>>
>> MM
>> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>> *From:*Alan Levin <alan at afridns.org <mailto:alan at afridns.org>>
>> *Sent:*Monday, January 13, 2020 3:33 AM
>> *To:*Mueller, Milton L <milton at gatech.edu <mailto:milton at gatech.edu>>
>> *Cc:*Wisdom Donkor <wisdom.dk at gmail.com 
>> <mailto:wisdom.dk at gmail.com>>; NCUC-discuss 
>> <ncuc-discuss at lists.ncuc.org <mailto:ncuc-discuss at lists.ncuc.org>>
>> *Subject:*Re: [NCUC-DISCUSS] Reuters reports new cooperative formed 
>> to take over management of .ORG
>> Hi,
>>
>> Milton, I am surprised by this.... it's pure opinion, and I must 
>> point it out to others... :(  comments inline...
>>
>> On Wed, Jan 8, 2020 at 7:41 PM Mueller, Milton L <milton at gatech.edu 
>> <mailto:milton at gatech.edu>> wrote:
>>
>>     Oh, this is such hypocrisy. So Andrew McLaughlin, Mike Roberts
>>     and Esther Dyson (who totally dissed the noncommercial
>>     constituency when they held positions of power in ICANN are now
>>     coming to the rescue of the noncommercial community by
>>     altruistically offering to take over an asset worth $1 billion.
>>
>>
>> Well actually at that time there was a MUCH stronger focus on At 
>> Large and we had a global election! Things were way better from the 
>> point of end users, we even had an accountable diverse board.  Some 
>> 20 years down the line there are still major issues here...
>>
>>     Those people are _/not/_ our friends.
>>
>>
>> Well, speak for yourself.  As far as I can see they are way better 
>> than the organisational ISOC/Ethos deal, from the .org perspective.
>>
>>     This is an example of why we need to be careful how we react to
>>     this proposed sale. This is just turning into a land grab, by
>>     which certain interests (e.g. Wikimedia Foundation) are seeking
>>     to exploit the controversy to take over ORG for themselves.
>>
>>
>> So are you also pointing to the wikimedia foundation as exploitative??
>>
>> I have been involved passionately in ISOC for 25 years... after Salt 
>> Lake City it was never the same. The Internet Society of South Africa 
>> had to split and create Internet South Africa. ISOC has institutional 
>> control and is in the Ethos deal.
>>
>> Sincerely
>>
>> Alan
>>
>>
>>     *From:*Ncuc-discuss <ncuc-discuss-bounces at lists.ncuc.org
>>     <mailto:ncuc-discuss-bounces at lists.ncuc.org>>*On Behalf Of*Wisdom
>>     Donkor
>>     *Sent:*Wednesday, January 8, 2020 5:28 AM
>>     *To:*NCUC-discuss <ncuc-discuss at lists.ncuc.org
>>     <mailto:ncuc-discuss at lists.ncuc.org>>
>>     *Subject:*[NCUC-DISCUSS] Reuters reports new cooperative formed
>>     to take over management of .ORG
>>     In this 7 January 2020 article
>>     <https://www.cnbc.com/2020/01/07/reuters-america-internet-nonprofit-leaders-fight-deal-to-sell-control-of-org-domain.html?__source=sharebar%7Ctwitter&par=sharebar> we
>>     learn that, "/prominent internet executives told Reuters they
>>     have created a nonprofit cooperative they are offering as an
>>     alternative owner of .org./"
>>     This would appear to me to pose an existential threat to ISOC, as
>>     this nonprofit cooperative - whose membership appears to me to
>>     have more political muscle than ISOC has - is not proposing to
>>     buy PIR from ISOC, but to instead have the .ORG Registry
>>     Agreement assigned to it by ICANN.
>>     The full article is here, and I have extracted some relevant
>>     quotes below:
>>     https://www.cnbc.com/2020/01/07/reuters-america-internet-nonprofit-leaders-fight-deal-to-sell-control-of-org-domain.html?__source=sharebar|twitter&par=sharebar
>>     <https://www.cnbc.com/2020/01/07/reuters-america-internet-nonprofit-leaders-fight-deal-to-sell-control-of-org-domain.html?__source=sharebar%7Ctwitter&par=sharebar>
>>     /“What offended me about the Ethos Capital deal and the way it
>>     unfolded is that it seems to have completely betrayed this
>>     concept of stewardship,” said Andrew McLaughlin, who oversaw the
>>     transfer of internet governance from the U.S. Commerce Department
>>     to ICANN, completed in 2016./
>>     /Maher and others said the idea of the new cooperative is not to
>>     offer a competing financial bid for .org, which brings in roughly
>>     $100 million in revenue from domain sales. Instead, they hope
>>     that the unusual new entity, formally a California Consumer
>>     Cooperative Corporation, can manage the domain for security and
>>     stability and make sure it does not become a tool for censorship./
>>     /... The initial seven directors of the cooperative include
>>     former founding ICANN President Michael Roberts, MacArthur
>>     Foundation philanthropist Jeff Ubois and Bill Woodcock, whose
>>     Packet Clearing House now runs the technical aspects of the .org
>>     system under contract./
>>     /The new group has briefed members of the U.S. Congress and hopes
>>     to prompt the Internet Society to reconsider the sale. But its
>>     best shot at stopping the pending sale lies with ICANN, which can
>>     veto any change in ownership out of concern for the security,
>>     reliability or stability of the .org domain./
>>     Best wishes,
>>     *WISDOM DONKOR*
>>     President & CEO
>>     Africa Open Data and Internet Research Foundation
>>     P.O. Box CT 2439, Cantonments, Accra |www.aodirf.org
>>     <http://www.aodirf.org/> /www.afrigeocon.org
>>     <http://www.afrigeocon.org/>
>>     Tel: +233 20 812 8851
>>     Skype: wisdom_dk | Facebook: kwasi wisdom |  Twitter: @wisdom_dk
>>     __________________________________________________
>>     Specialization:
>>     E-government Network Infrastructure and E-application, Internet
>>     Governance, Open Data policies platforms & Community Development,
>>     Cyber Security, Domain Name Systems, Software Engineering, Event
>>     Planning & Management,
>>     _______________________________________________
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>>     Ncuc-discuss at lists.ncuc.org <mailto:Ncuc-discuss at lists.ncuc.org>
>>     https://lists.ncuc.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/ncuc-discuss
>>
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-- 
Kathy Kleiman
President, Domain Name Rights Coalition

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